The Free Republic Militia
by James Foxhound
Summary: When Krystal needs some help, she falls into a web of conspiracy, alternate dimensions, and old friends and foes... some who want her dead, some who want to help. WARNING: Character death!
1. Chapter 1

AN: So I decided to do something different. This is a crossover fic between my current freelance work and Starfox, so not everything makes perfect sense.

* * *

Krystal was angry.

Mostly at herself.

When the starfighters approached the Great Fox, she could only watch as her friends where, one by one, disabled. Backing off, she saw them vanish in the flash of what HAD to have been an antimatter bomb. Even worse, she had no clue who the fighters worked for; the only thing she had seen was the initials NGO on the wings.

Then she got a letter:

_Dear Krystal,_

_I'm sorry about your loss. As a key witness to the events, I'm asking you to join our search for the unit or units that destroyed the rest of Star Fox. I'll be waiting at the rave club called the 'Funky Penguin', just ask for me._

_Sincerely,_

_Freedom 0_

(Location: Funky Penguin rave/bar)

Krystal was surprised. None other than king Dedede was manning the rave, his hammer strung with glowsticks. She walked over to the bar and sat down. "What'll it be, miss?" the barkeep asked.

"I'm looking for someone who goes by the name of 'Freedom 0'."

The barkeep looked around in a slightly paranoid manner. "Not many ask for him, especially those who are smart. Were you invited?"

"Yes."

"Well than, let me take you to the man behind the Free Republic Militia," the barkeep replied, walking out from behind the bar and showing her to a door in the back.

(Free Republic Militia office)

James looked up from his desk for a moment. "Come in."

Krystal walked in, closing the door behind her. "I'm here."

"Welcome, then. I'm James Freeman, AKA 'Freedom 0'."

Krystal took a moment to take a good look at James. He was strange for an anthromorph; his legs where not strait, but more like a fox's; his jaw was elongated to the extreme, and she swore she saw some very sharp canines in his mouth. At his sides where a pair of pistols, whose magazines read: .50 AE. "Well, what do you want?" Krystal asked.

"I've just got a few questions for you. Sit down," James said, sliding behind his desk as Krystal took a seat in the only other chair in the office. "Do you, by any chance, remember the markings on the wings of the fighters used to attack the Great Fox?"

"Yeah, they where just initials: N G O."

"Oh dear lord…"

"What?" Krystal asked, raising a questioning eyebrow.

"Never mind for a moment. I know I'm touching on some… emotional information here, but you said they 'disappeared'. How?"

"I saw one of the fighters place a small device on the Great Fox's hull, and… and…" Krystal started to lose control of her emotions, "they vanished in a flash. It must have been an antimatter device…"

"Krystal, it wasn't."

"Then what the hell was it?!" Krystal yelled at James, anger mixing with her sadness.

"A device called a 'Jump Drive'. Krystal, I've got to fill you in on some things that are considered top secrete…"

* * *

AN: Yes, the team isn't dead… but expect character death later on.


	2. Chapter 2

AN: If someone says "OMG KRYSTAL X JAMES!", I will immediately deploy my SF Mara and blow the fuck out of you with my Kasers. If you're wondering, this links to a freelance story I'm writing, currently called "Storm Burner" (which takes place before/during this story).

* * *

Krystal was shocked, to say the least. "OK, so you're from an alternate dimension where the Lylat system doesn't exist, humans have discovered space flight and a faster-than-light transport method, werewolves exist, an alien race called the 'Kranath' dwell, some crazy intergalactic menace called the 'Vorta' attempted to destroy all other life, and you came here to stop some sort of evil society called the 'New Galactic Order'?!"

"In short, yes."

"Good GOD, my head's gonna explode!" Krystal yelled, holding her head between her hands.

"Information overload?" James asked peeking in from the back room where he was trying to find something to calm her down.

"YES."

"Well, just give it a moment, I'll see if I can find something…" James said, looking for where he had stashed that bottle of Smirnoff. "Ah, here it is! One bottle of Smirnoff Vodka, coming right up!"

"Please, I don't drink," Krystal mentioned.

"Ok, then… Damn it, I forgot to get drinks."

"I'll be fine, OK?"

"You look like you're about to faint, and I know how people react to info overload. You are NOT fine," James replied, brining with him some ice water. "Look, just wait until you're feeling a little less head-go-boom-ish, then I'll continue explaining. OK?"

Krystal was slightly surprised about how James spoke. "Ok," she said, drinking down the glass in two gulps. Just then, a klaxon went off. "What the?!"

James dashed over to his desk and the wall monitor on. "James here. Why the bloody hell did you set off my alarm?!"

General Pepper appeared on screen. "James, we have a… situation. Everyone who does not have Omega-level clearance must leave the room. Understood?"

James looked at Krystal for a moment, then looked back at Pepper. "I've got a emergency request for Krystal to be upgraded to Omega-level."

"Damn it, James, you're a tough bargain. Request granted," General Pepper replied. "We have a serous situation taking place."

Krystal raised a questioning eyebrow. "What kind of situation?"

"At 0700 hours, an unknown ship warped in at the edge of the Lylat system and quickly sped toward Corneria. Classifying as a level 10 threat, we dispatched an AWACS ship to scan it from a distance. What we found was startling." General Pepper explained, an image of a heavily-modified Arwing appeared. It had four wings instead of the original two; a pair of gun pods where mounted on either side, along with a larger missile bay. "This Arwing, codenamed Faustus, appears to be a modification of Fox Mccloud's personal Arwing with NGO technology. The ship is fully capable of matching a MX-700 Shadow Hawk, AKA Shawk, in combat, a great advancement from the NGO Ravager II. This brought about a command decision: the Faustus MUST be stopped by any means necessary. We have fully authorized your strike for use of the Magnus 339 Fulcrum ACM."

"Fulcrum ACM?" Krystal asked.

"It's a specialized missile for cracking heavy shielding. And we might just need it, if that thing has the shields of the Shawk," James said.

"James, get your ass up there and intercept!"

"Rodger, sir!" James exclaimed, saluting. The monitor shut off, as James and Krystal dashed to the fighter bay. Inside were a pair of fighters with radically forward-swept wings, multiple thrusters, ion engines, what appeared to be a SCRAM-jet engine, and large bomb/missile racks. The main hull of the ship was arrow-shaped, with the cockpit located centrally. However, there where several fighter bays still open.

"What's with the missing craft?" Krystal asked as she buckled herself into one of the Shadow Hawk fighters.

"The rest of the unit is on patrol. Hopefully, they'll be in position to assist us, otherwise this might be one tough fight. Anyway, just engage your engines and follow my lead," James said, firing up his ship's engines. Krystal followed him out, dodging some light traffic on their exit course.

"You seem to be a little sad over this whole operation, James. What is going on?"

"I'm just guessing at this, but there are three possibilities. The first is that Fox stole the Faustus; the second is that someone else is piloting it, and the third… is that they've mentally conditioned Fox to attack Corneria," James said, letting out a sigh.

"You're kidding."

"I wish I was, Krystal. However, if it is the third one, it can't be perfect. It takes months, even years, to get someone fully conditioned. My guess is it would be a very quick job. As I figure it, seeing you might break the conditioning. However, the shields on that craft are designed to block out all incoming communications, so I packed a few EMP devices," James explained.

"So we're on a rescue mission?"

"I hope so… Ok, we've cleared traffic level. Time for full throttle."

Krystal pushed the throttle control to max, surprising herself with how fast the ship accelerated. "Sheeh, this thing doesn't hold back!"

"The Shawk's max speed is about Mach 10, and that's without afterburners; however, usual combat speeds are much slower."

Krystal didn't comment, watching her rear view camera as Corneria pulled away…

* * *

AN: Next chapter's gonna be a blast… Beware, Freespace (and Freespace 2… and Inferno R1…) references will abound. (And, yes, I made a reference to both Christopher Marlow and Battletech. First to tell me how I did that gets a cookie!)


	3. Chapter 3

AN: and so the mystery deepens, as we begin in an old battlefield…

* * *

(Battleship graveyard, near Lylat system edge)

"Wow, so many dead ships…"

"And a hell of a lot of cover for the Faustus. I'm glad I got those jamming devices now…" James mentioned, steering his ship past a chunk of an old carrier's hull.

"Damn, this place has a story to tell…" Krystal said, looking out her side window. An old Hercules fighter had crashed into a chunk of hull, its 'rudder' cutting a gash in the pitted metal. A Pegasus stealth fighter had managed to embed its nose in another fighter, the blood of its pilot still on the windscreen. A huge battleship with a giant hole burned through it slowly rotated, just as dead as its crew; she could see the name on the side: KSA Isis. "These aren't our ships…"

"Nope. Most are from the third great war, where we stopped the NGO from attacking the Lylat system," James explained, checking his wide-beam radar. "Hang on, I'm getting an NGO signature on the scope. It's the Faustus!" James yelled, dodging the Faustus's pulse guns. "I can't shake him!"

"Just a second…" Krystal begged, her onboard computer struggling to get an aspect lock on the Faustus.

LOCKING…

LOCKED

The EMP missile detonated on the Faustus's shields, knocking it for a loop. The ship shut down, only to restart seconds later. "Ok, who the hell is piloting this thing?" James asked.

"Crap, what the fuck happen… Krystal? What the hell?"

Krystal let out a sigh of relief. "You OK in there, Fox?"

"I will be. What the fuck is going on here?" Fox asked, regaining control over his ship.

"Fox, all I will say is that you cannot speak of any of this to anybody under Omega-level clearance. Understood?"

"Yes, sir…"

"Alright, fall in behind me. We'll be out of here in a second… WHAT THE FUCK?!" James yelled, dodging a capital ship's beam cannon. "SHIT! Break formation! We've been duped! Target ID'd as the NGO Iceni, juggernaut class! Keep moving, this thing has more flack than you can shake a stick at!"

"Flack? What the hell? Talk about outdated!"

"Tell that to the fifteen bomber squadrons and five corvettes we lost from it! DODGE!" James yelled, forcibly knocking Fox out of the way of very large red laser beam. "There's a REASON we call that gun the Big Fucking Red!"

James got a hail from the NGO Iceni. "Stand down and dock, or we will destroy you."

"I'll never stand down to the likes of you, Jankowski! Fox, prepare for a suicide dive!"

"Are you nuts?!"

"I'd rather go down fighting these basterds than end up dead for nothing!" James yelled, spinning his ship around and diving at the Iceni. The flack bursts threatened to knock his fighter off course; James stayed steady, launching KD-15 Trebuchet missiles at the ship's beam cannons. Nothing worked; in a rare move for a capital ship of its size, the Iceni had shields. "Damn it, NOTHING works! If we just had a capital ship…"

As if on cue, a large ship jumped in, spraying ion cannon fire. Captain Jankowski struggled to keep himself from falling over as his ship shook about, its shields and weapons loosing some of their power due to the positive ion particles bombarding his ship, stealing electrons from their power systems. "This is captain Jankowski of the New Galactic Order. Identify yourself!"

Wolf O'Donnell appeared on the vidcom screen. "This is Lord O'Donnell, current commander of the cruiser Warhammer. Power down your weapon systems and prepare to be boarded, or we will force you to power down."

"Never! The New Galactic Order will not be pushed around by the likes of you, filth!" Jankowski yelled, spitting at the screen.

"So be it. Lord O'Donnell out."

The Warhammer continued its assault, shutting down all systems except for life support. A small ship moved in on the Iceni, docking and unloading its deadly cargo of combat droids. "You'll never have me alive!" Jankowski yelled over comms.

"All things considered, I don't give a shit if those combat droids that are now on your ship kill you or not. If they do, it makes my job easier. If not… I'll still be killing you. I've got a mission, and I intend to carry it out."

James recognized something about Wolf's statement. "Hang on, go to encryption level three."

"What is it, Freeman?"

"You're with Special Operations Command, aren't you?"

"Bingo! Omega-level, too."

"Same. They never give anybody except a few commanders the list of omega-level personnel. Why a pirate, though?"

"I already was a pirate when I joined SOC, and it was the perfect cover to attack Andross from. And besides, it got that bounty off my head."

James heard a beeping coming from his comms unit. "Direct communication from General Pepper, putting on screen and deactivating encryption."

"James, GET BACK HERE! The Faustus was just a diversion! We're under attack by the NGO Navy _AND_ Andross!"

"CRAP! Alright, people, maximum burn! We need to get back to Corneria, and FAST!"

* * *

AN: the power of SNAFU strikes again. Prepare for a ridiculously huge plot twist…


	4. Chapter 4

AN: Isn't this an interesting situation? Warning: weird shit will happen!

* * *

(Corneria orbit)

Beam cannons sent their blasts thousands of directions as capital ships duked it out for rule of Corneria. The ruins of thousands of ships dotted the background, fighters and bombers weaving in-between, hoping to get a shot at doing damage to a frigate or destroyer. The regular Cronerian navy wasn't doing too well, but Special Operations Command was. General Pepper hailed James.

"Andross has broken off. He's heading toward our sun, but for what purpose I can hardly dare imagine. James, you've got to stop him!"

"Rodger that, Sir! I just hope it isn't what I'm thinking it is…" James replied, turning off toward the star and hitting afterburners. Two NGO fightercraft came at him; James spun into a spiral dive, shut off his engines and reduced his inertial dampener, spinning around and blasting the NGO Ravager with a pair of short range missiles. James switched back to normal flight, blowing a Stallone fighter that had started tailing Fox apart with his dual Crass-34 rapid heavy pulse guns.

"Thanks!"

"Just doing my job," James replied. "We've only got open space between us and Andross, so let's move!"

(Andross's solar base)

James spotted two other members of the Free Republic Militia trying to get off a killing blow on Andross's base. "Sarah, status report!"

"Shields are holding, same with Andross. He seems to be using some sort of sheath shielding system, and I haven't seen that since I saw an ultra-dreadnaught. James, this is the most heavily shielded station I've ever seen, but it has almost no beam cannons. I'm detecting some sort of meson-particle emissions, and that means he's got a meson device!"

"You've got to be fucking KIDDING, sis!"

"I wish I was! We need to get onboard and shut down that shield FAST!"

Fox blinked a few times. "Wait, you're his sister?!"

"Yep! Didn't you notice the family resemblance?" Sarah asked; she had a point, she and James looked fairly similar. "Hell, his girlfriend, Chandla, is also here…"

A female snow leopard appeared on the comscreen, eyebrow raised. "Someone mention me?"

"Cut the chatter, I'm getting an incoming jump signature… It's the Iceni!"

The Iceni charged its main beam cannon… and fired at Andross's space station. "Didn't think I was going to sit by and let Andross blow up our star, did you?"

"WOLF?!"

"In the flesh!" Wolf said, appearing on the comscreen. "Get in there though that hole I just punched though! You don't have time to sit around!"

"Rodger that!" James yelled, piloting his fighter though the hole in the station's shielding, followed by the rest of the team… only to be stopped right inside of the docking bay by some invisible force. "What the FUCK?! I can't move!"

"Muahahaha!" Andross exclaimed, appearing in some sort of flaming hologram. "So I made this deal with the devil for ultimate power, you see… 'Sure thing, Andross, just let me hold your spot'… and he gives me ultimate power!"

"You're insane!" James replied.

"Au contraire, fool! I still have ultimate power! And now, Fox… time to make you suffer…"

All the comlinks closed except for the one between Fox and Krystal… and Andross started to suffocate Krystal. "NO! STOP!"

"Muahahaha! MUAHAHA!!"

(Krystal's mind)

Krystal knew she was dieing… but something had seemingly halted time. "Sorry, Krystal, I just can't let you die."

"Who the hell are you?"

"A friend from another plane of existence. Look, you have two choices right now: I can join with you, and we finish this fight, or you die. I can't fight Andross because I can't manifest without an anchor point or someone willing to act as one, and you can't fight Andross because he's fused himself with… my brother…"

"Fused?"

"He… he somehow tricked my brother and is using some sort of containment field to keep him from striking back. Look, we both have a lot on the line here, and neither of us can wait for very long!"

"Alright… what is your name, anyway?"

"Ryoken."

Krystal felt a power she never could have imagined…

(Reality)

Andross was surprised as Krystal leapt out of her fighter's cockpit, surrounded by some sort of energy aura. "WHAT THE FUCK?!"

"I'm back…"

Andross sent energy bursts at Krystal; Krystal dodged, sending a flame pillar at Andross. She then let out a massive 'scanning' energy burst.

_Ok, the power node's somewhere on this level._

Krystal nodded, and dashed down one hall at an amazing speed, clotheslineing a pair of combat droids with energy blades. Right in front of her was the power node for the station… she let loose with an energy burst that forced a tremendous amount of power down the line.

"What the hell just happened?" Fox asked.

James appeared over the comlink. "Not sure, but I think we've got some sort of energy being on our side. I've only seen that kind of power once before…"

Krystal appeared on the comscreen, even though she obviously wasn't in her fighter. "Get out of here, the situation may become extremely explosive at any moment!"

James turned around and used his afterburner to smash through the weaker inner shield; everyone else followed suit, but Fox hesitated for a second.

"Just go Fox. I'll be fine! I've just got some… unfinished business…"

(Bridge of Andross's base)

"YOU!"

"Yes, me. I'm back, you basterd," Ryoken replied, manifesting as a yellow-orange dragon 'hologram'. "You should have expected that."

"YOU MUST DIE!!" Andross yelled, sending out a beams of energy.

Krystal and Ryoken both dodged. "Goddamn it, how much longer?!"

"Not much, I hope!"

Andross unleashed a very large beam at Krystal. Krystal and Ryoken countered with a beam in the opposite direction; the two beams impacted each other, slowly edging toward them. Krystal and Ryoken concentrated harder, their beam growing in strength…

"Just a little longer…"

The explosion of power from the core of Andross's base finally reached the containment system, blowing every fuse and smashing it to smithereens. Andross screamed and ran for his escape pod, which he had conveniently readied beforehand. "You'll still have to deal with my meson torpedoes!"

"MENSON TORPEDOES?!" James yelled through his comlink. "Dear lord, he's trying to create a solar flare of such magnitude it cripples Corneria!"

Wolf quickly hit a few bridge controls. "Krystal, we can't beam you out! Goddamn sheath shields!"

_Perhaps I can help._

Ryoken charged up an energy burst of a similar frequency to Krystal's neural energy signature; the beam-out sequence worked flawlessly.

"Main beam cannon, open fire!" Wolf yelled; the BFR cannon on the front of the Iceni barely did anything to the station. "Goddamn it! Overcharge the cannon, I don't give a flying fuck if it blows out all our forward capacitors!"

All available power was re-routed to the forward cannon; the beam changed from red to a whitish-blue color, tearing though the station in one shot. The meson torpedoes exploded, sending out a massive shockwave.

General Pepper appeared over the comms. "Good show out there. Corneria is safe for the moment, so come back for debrief. Fox, I need to speak with you in person."

"Yes, sir…" Fox muttered, heading for Corneria alongside the Iceni. James and the rest of the Free Republic Militia formed up, escorting the ship back to base.

* * *

Well now, isn't this interesting? No, we haven't seen the last of Ryoken yet. And has anyone spotted the Freespace 2 capital ship I've inserted?! Sheesh, I thought it was obvious...


End file.
